I Will be Your Shield
by kitkaht
Summary: Because there are certain things you just can't do alone. A series of ES21 short stories. Various pairings, slash/gen/het
1. Umbrella

**_Rating:_** G_.__  
**Pairing:**_ Verrrry light Kakei/Mizumachi_  
**Summary:**_ In that moment Kakei couldn't help but wonder what exactly Mizumachi was trying to tell him. Knowing him it was probably still _'you should try stripping in the rain'_, but with those unfathomable dark eyes sometimes it was impossible to tell._  
**Notes**_**:** So, basically this is a series of shorts because my friend apelilly and I do fictag and I feel slightly guilty spamming you guys just because I've been so bored I've been writing shittons of crap. I swear, soon I'll be in University and you'll not have to worry about me! This one was inspired by that song I'm sure we all got annoyed by at some point, Rihanna's Umbrella (ella, ella). Like this one, most of these are probably going to be music challenge. And also there will likely be gayness. Lots of it.

That's just how I roll.

* * *

_Umbrella_

"Mizumachi..." Kakei sighed in an exaggerated manner as he stood under the terrace, watching his teammate peel off his clothing. He was just carelessly tossing his clothes anywhere he felt; his shirt went onto a bench, his pants into a puddle, who even knew where his jacket was now. This was, as always, going to be problematic. "Mizumachi, get over here."

The blonde haired boy looked back towards his teammate as if only just noticing his presence, lips pursed and heavy droplets of rain beating down on his shoulders and dripping down his exposed skin. "Ehh? Why?"

"Because you'll catch you death, is why!" Kakei snapped out the words, fixing Mizumachi with an intense and intensely disapproving glare. He was an idiot, stripping in the rain and dancing around! Didn't he know how import he was to the team? "Or you'll slip and break your bones!"

"No I won't!" Mizumachi's laugh was deep and joyous and completely unignorable. Just like his sunny bright grin, fixed right onto Kakei as he flailed his arms about in what would have been a gesture for a normal person. "It's just like swimming, but on land! Besides idiots can't catch colds!"

So he knew. Regardless... "You're going to count on a myth to stop you from getting sick and dying?" Perhaps it was an exaggeration, but that was how it had to be with Mizumachi. All grandiose and exaggerated, everything had to be big and bold and if it wasn't loud enough or bright enough he wasn't going to bother paying it any attention. How he even noticed Kakei in the first place was a wonder. "Get over here!"

"No!" The unnaturally tall man leaned over, hands on his hips, as the rain visibly bounced and rolled off his skin in translucent droplets, although he hardly seemed to notice. "You get over here!"

"Don't be ridiculous! If you don't get over here you're going to catch pneumonia!"

"If you don't get over here you're going to be a sour old lady forever!"

He wasn't even going to address that weird insult.

"I'd rather that than to be in the hospital!" And Mizumachi should have rathered it too. He was a pivotal part of their team. They couldn't go on without him, not the way they were. If that idiot went and got himself permanently hurt, or did some serious damage to his lungs, Kakei wouldn't ever forgive him. "If you want to swim then swim later in a pool! But if you want to be able to fight in a competition with the rest of your team then get back here and get some clothes on!"

Mizumachi was giving him that look again, the look he'd seen the first time they'd met and he'd declared that they were going to go to the nationals. It was as blank as a slate, no pursed lips, but no sunny grin. Just wide, dark eyes staring at him in intense, indecipherable interest.

"Let's do both. I'll fight with the team no matter what, but I want to swim too!" And then that million watt grin was back, bright even through the thick sheet of rain between them. "Come on! You should try swimming on land, it's really fun!"

"It's really stupid is what it is!" And not even swimming at all, he might add. Kakei could feel the beginnings of a headache, right between his eyes. It would spread to the back of his head and down his neck if the walking headache smiling at him from the middle of the rain storm didn't stop his antics soon.

"Maybe." Kakei felt relief wash through him as Mizumachi walked towards the terrace, the sound of his steps drowned out by the downpour. Of course he would have felt more relieved if Mizumachi had collected his now rain drenched clothes. "But you should do stupid stuff sometimes."

Mizumachi's tanned hand was cold and wet as he grabbed Kakei's and his smile was completely different, something less exuberant but no less full of feeling. In that moment Kakei couldn't help but wonder what exactly Mizumachi was trying to tell him. Knowing him it was probably still _'you should try stripping in the rain'_, but with those unfathomable dark eyes sometimes it was impossible to tell.

His hand was not nice to hold at all, slick and cold.

"Come on!" Mizumachi tugged on his hand with all that athletic strength that he had always been blessed with and Kakei was forced forwards, just a little, droplets of water spattering onto his arm, before he pulled back just as hard.

"I am not stripping in the rain, and if you walk home like that you'll die." Kakei snatched his hand away, it wasn't hard with how slick it was from the rain, and tried to ignore how cold the words had sounded, even to him. Instead he turned around and away from his teammates's shocked face. "Stop messing around already."

He wondered, as he picked up his umbrella, if he was being a bit harsh. But it was important to be strict. He was the captain now and it was his responsibility to keep the team in shape and to protect them.

Even from themselves.

Kakei turned back around, umbrella in hand, and fixed Mizumachi with an only slightly disapproving look. "But it's not like you can put your uniform back on now. And you're already freezing." Kakei opened his plain black, but unfailingly sturdy, umbrella off to the side. "You don't even have an umbrella with you, do you?

Mizumachi laughed again and grinned at him, like if he did it hard enough he wouldn't catch a cold. "Nope! Why would I?"

Kakei sighed again and lifted the umbrella over the other boy, just a slight taller than him. Of all the things to say... "Then we'll get your clothes and we can go to the onsen. You can warm up there and swim in _water_. Maybe if you're lucky your clothes will be wearable when we get out." Probably not. And the school would be all locked up now, or he would get his spare uniform for him. It wouldn't be the first time Mizumachi had borrowed his spare uniform, or at least some part of it. "Come on then."

Kakei felt the umbrella get gently plucked out of his hands just as he stepped out from under the terrace. And for one infuriating second he thought Mizumachi was going to leave him out in the rain, just to try and get him to do what he wanted. But when he stepped out the umbrella was still there, shielding both of them from the rain, Mizumachi's tanned hand wrapped around the metal. Although it wouldn't shield Kakei from his friend's dripping hair.

"Kakei's really reliable, huh?" Mizumachi laughed animatedly, the umbrella bobbing with his movements. "I like that about you!"

When Kakei turned to look at him in surprise but Mizumachi was looking forward and already starting to move towards the bench where his shirt lay, leaving Kakei trying to keep up with him. "Don't worry! I'll hold the umbrella reliably, just like you!"

Really, Kakei wasn't sure if it was because he didn't want Mizumachi to look over and see him going red up to his ears or because he appreciated the sentiment, but either way he didn't say that the loose way his friend was holding the umbrella combined with his striding, bobbing steps were actually making it wobble all over the place. Instead he just bent down to pick up Mizumachi's soaked shirt and wrung it out as best he could, his left arm getting pelted with rain the whole time.


	2. Fly

**_Rating:_** G_.__  
**Pairing:**_ _None  
**Summary:**_ To be able to run so quickly was a gift, the best one that he had ever received.  
_**Notes**_**:** Not hugely into ES21 anymore, Pokemon, of all things, has sunk it's claws into me, but I've got junk lying on my computer and you've got one hell of a slow moving fandom.

I think we can help each other out.

* * *

To be able to run so quickly was a gift, the best one that he had ever received. It was a gift that an overconfident, undersized young brat and bestowed upon Sena when Sena, really, hadn't had anything else.

Since then Sena had been able to avoid the pain of bullies. Perhaps it was by being their errand boy, but nonetheless the days of sore arms, twisted out of place, stinging bruises covering his back and eyes swollen shut were gone once and for all. And when he was flying down the street, down the hallways, through the park, he didn't mind that he was being a gopher. He didn't mind because the wind whipped through his hair and across his face playfully, his feet hit the ground rhythmically and his vision tunnelled, leaving only that precious, safe, goal in his mind. There was a thrill to it, an exhilaration like he was almost flying, gliding along the ground on wings that, perhaps, were too weak to lift him up into the sky but not too weak to lift his burning legs just off the ground.

And then he was brought crashing back down again as he presented the bullies with his money, or their books topped with his money, or a coke that he had bought them with his money. If he was lucky they'd grin and tell him 'good job', if he wasn't they would push him out of the way and, usually, into a wall.

American football had changed that.

Suddenly he was whipping down the field with 11 people who wanted him pulverized into a bloody pulp, and the faster he ran the more they wanted him crushed. There was no way to placate them, no amount of lunch money that would stop their conquest to turn him into a smear on the field. It was just them, all stronger, all bigger, all more experienced, and on the most rare of occasions, faster, against his weak, pitiful self.

But it wasn't the same as before, it was immeasurably different, because at the same time that those 11 people wanted to drag him below them and crush him, he had 10 people who wanted to save him, to lift him up into the blue sky. There were 10 people who would throw him into the air and let his weak wings fly him higher than ever before. And when he reached the goal on those pathetic wings, blown by the wind his team had created just for him, those people wouldn't drag him down or push him around. They would embrace him with all their might, latch onto him, and they'd all fly with all their strength. And Sena, who had stood at the top of Tokyo Tower, who had flown in a plane thousands of kilometres from the ground, could safely say he had never felt like he was higher up in his entire life than when his team scored a goal.

Maybe it was naive, but if he could do one thing then he would like teach everyone how to fly that high, just like one overconfident, undersized brat had done for him.


End file.
